Original subtitles

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Man: Ooh!

Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX

Ooh.

How cool is this?

Pete: Well I, sometimes I can get ahead of myself, and my enthusiasm can lead me

Into things that I hadn't fully thought of or planned out that well.

(music)

It's hard not to love the grand canyon.

"grand" is too simple of a word for the place.

(music)

I'm a photographer and I got the idea of exploring the canyon on foot

'cause I saw that the place is changing.

Lester: It's one of america's most iconic landmarks,

But now a proposed project is drawing controversy.

Newscaster: The proposed development would cover 420 acres of navajo land,

Right down to the canyon floor.

Renae: That needs to be protected for our children.

Pete: What is the state of our public lands?

Is it true what was happening that I'd been hearing from people that live

Inside the national park?

Man: The helicopters are a mess.

Woman: It's overdeveloped.

Where does all this money go?

We were never supposed to let it get that bad.

Jason: The developers have tricked people.

This whole area is littered with uranium mines.

David: This is the most protected place in the world,

And yet I spend most of my time protecting this place.

Pete: I decided to hike the entire length of the grand canyon.

You don't know what you don't know.

How hard could this be?

(music)

Kevin: I don't have a good explanation for why I actually listened to pete mcbride

When he showed up at my house in flagstaff, arizona and laid out this idea

Which basically consisted of, "hey, you and I should walk through the grand canyon.

I want to do this project and I want to do it with you."

Pete: Kevin, uh, I knew where he was gonna stand on things.

But I proposed this idea to him maybe walking the park.

I told him I could convince national geographic to give us a platform to tell a story.

Kevin: He assured me that I didn't need to do anything to prepare.

That I could basically get off the couch, and, and, and head into the canyon

And it would be cool.

Pete: I somehow made kevin believe that we could do this.

Kevin: He knew that I was fascinated by and obsessed with this landscape and he knew that

That idea would be almost impossible for me to resist.

Pete: Did I sell kevin a bag of goods?

Uh,

Ye-, on some level, yes.

Kevin: What do you have in here? Did you sneak like a garbage bag full of burritos in here?

Did you stop at taco bell?

Pete: Should I not bring chocolate cake?

Pilot: Alright, let's roll.

(music)

Pete: So here's the thing.

Even though kevin and I have worked in and around the grand canyon for years,

We're not what I would call hiking fanatics, but we deeply love this landscape.

As crazy as this idea was, we wanted to do it in part because so few have done it.

More people have stood on the moon than have hiked nonstop through the grand canyon.

But more importantly there's this growing notion that the canyon is for sale.

(music)

Hiking is one way to see what's at risk to be lost in grand canyon

If we don't pay attention.

(music)

The pack feels really heavy.

We're gonna get in shape on this I think right, is that the plan?

Kevin: I don't know, I'm starting to think maybe this wasn't such a good idea

Of it ah and we're, we're at the point of n-no return.

Pete: I guess we're going, that way.

For a long ways.

Rich: Yeah, I've spent 700 nights below the rim.

But uh, this will by, by far be the longest trip.

My first introduction to grand canyon was you know twenty-five years ago on a river trip

And I came away just amazed in awe and I've spent half of my life in that place.

Pete: Rich is probably the most seasoned grand canyon hiker that exists on the planet.

Rich: I got a call saying, you know, "pete mcbride is looking to go walking the canyon.

Could he tag along with us for the first twelve days through a difficult section of the

Canyon?"

Alright, step over the line.

Kind of get their sea legs under them, if you will.

And they will hopefully acquire enough knowledge to continue on their own.

Carry on, lads.

(music)

(music)

(laughs)

(heavy breathing) pete: Hour 1.

How far are we going?

Kevin: I don't think we've gone 5 miles yet.

Rich: People thru-hike the pacific crest trail or the appalachian trail, 2,000,

Almost 3,000 miles .

And so when you talk to people about hiking through grand canyon,

And I-it doesn't really click as being significant.

But hiking through the canyon is probably one of the hardest things that you can do on earth.

There's not a trail at all.

You're climbing up and down thousands and thousands of vertical feet .

Pete: I'm good, I'm good.

Rich: And friends have got to store food ahead of you. Pete: Nuts.

Rich: Or you'll starve.

Grand canyon is so enormous, and the idea that you could just hit the sos button and the park

Service will swoop in in half an hour and scrape you up is a fallacy.

Pete: The leg cramps, the hand cramps, the arm cramps.

Kevin: I was told that the yesterday would be the hardest day.

Man: Agh!

Kevin: Wow, that arm is trashed.

I don't see any difference whatsoever between yesterday, the day before yesterday,

The first day and today.

Rich: Water is tremendously important.

Nothing will kill you faster in grand canyon then running out of water.

It is a remarkably dangerous place.

(sound of falling rocks)

You know, helping these guys isn't easy.

(laughs)

They weren't prepared for the terrain.

The 100-plus degree temperatures

They had too much gear they were carrying, and they quickly fell apart on many levels.

Their feet turned to hamburger, kevin sprained both ankles, pete nearly went unconscious

From a condition called hyponatremia, it's basically the opposite of dehydration.

It had become pretty clear to us that, that pete and kevin were not gonna make it,

And they we're going to have to exit.

Kevin: We returned to flagstaff with our tails between our legs.

Pete: It was embarrassing, and it was really humbling for me, uh, on many levels.

Felt bad I talked kevin into this, I mean, total (bleep) show.

Kevin: The other thing that happened after that first leg is that the woman I lived with, um,

Moved out, 48 hours after we got home.

So um, so there was that too, yeah.

Pete: I've known kevin for a while.

Working as journalists I often tried to convince him to do what I thought were the untold

Stories, the important stories.

Kevin: Magazine assignments in different parts of the world.

I went through a series of these with pete before I internalized the lesson that it was just

A bad idea to be working with pete in the first place.

Pete: Djibouti. Took a lot of images of people selling an illegal drug there.

The complicated narcotic trade.

Kevin: Uh we were deported when they discovered we had tried to enter the country with tourist

Visas claiming that we were scuba divers.

Pete: Had to smuggle the images out, that was challenging.

Following the largest migration of caribou in north america.

Kevin: You would think that two journalists would be capable of locating this herd,

We spent about three weeks out there and we found one dead caribou.

Pete: That was an oops.

Everest, the sherpa nobody knows about, who built the route on the south side.

Kevin: We were almost killed by a massive avalanche inside the icefall.

It was a debacle.

Pete: Not ideal.

Kevin: Everything that we've done has basically turned into the equivalent of like,

You know, a very large boat that ran into an iceberg.

Pete: Well, I mean, may-, yeah, well, maybe.

Are the feet still trashed?

Kevin: Ah, they're getting better.

Pete: If we were gonna have any hope of finishing this project,

We had to rethink our entire plan.

Kevin: There are two ways to hike through the grand canyon.

You can do so as a continuous push which is called a thru-hike without stopping,

Or you can break that journey up into sections.

Pete: Moving at a steady pace would take about two-and-a-half months,

But we decided to break up the hike over the course of a year to see the canyon

In its different seasons.

Alright, all said and done, I'm going from this tripod to that.

Kevin: Thank goodness.

Pete: We had to totally redo our program.

Cut down our weight, rethink our nutrition, and we realized we needed some canyon gurus

To help us find our way.

So we spoke to rich and he called a bunch of his buddies to make sure we didn't kill

Ourselves in the process.

Part of me wants to actually throw this shirt out 'cause it reminds me of that whole first

Experience.

Kevin: Can you still smell yourself?

Pete: I washed it twice.

It still kind of stinks.

Alright so this is round two.

Matt and kelly are kindly helping us find the route on this next section.

We've learned the hard way that carrying really heavy packs in a really hot place is dumb.

Kelly: You're 5 pounds heavier than you were last night.

It's 37 pounds .

Matt: That's 1 camera addition. What are we at?

Kelly: 37. Matt: 37.

Pete: 37? You don't have my water in there either.

Kelly: You have no water in there?

Pete: We, I'm missing a bottle.

Matt: This is the weight of one camera right here.

It's not backbreaking, um, but it could be day after day.

It's the difference between having a really fun,

Free-flowing moving trip and suffering.

Pete: And tell me about blisters, kev.

Kevin: I'm, uh, ub, I'm, um, suffering from uh, eh, selective memory loss as a result

Of the pain that was induced by the blisters last time, so.

I've got my feet basically encased in duct tape at this point.

(music)

(music)

Pete: You doing alright? Kevin: Yup.

(music)

(music)

Pete: The grand canyon is over 6,000 feet deep.

It's so deep you could stack 5 empire state buildings, one on top of the other, inside it.

There are river miles , and there are hiking miles.

The colorado river is the main highway through the canyon, and it's two hundred and seventy

Seven miles long.

If you're hiking, you have to go up and down and around all these drainages and tributaries.

It ends up being more like seven hundred and fifty miles.

(music)

It's like hiking the entire length of california.

Matt: What do you got there?

Kelly: I have the sole to an old, I mean, work boot is what I can see.

And the nails, you could see all the nails coming through.

Held up fairly well I'd say.

Matt: It makes one understand how close the dam was to being built.

This was almost an industrial complex here,

That this river corridor in the dam was nearly industrialized.

Kevin: We demonstrated the wisdom to create a national park system.

We love to think of it as our best idea.

Teddy roosevelt stood on the south rim of the grand canyon in 1903,

He was speaking to a series of developers, timber barons, and miners,

And he said this is a landscape that needs to be left as it is so that it can be passed along

To future generations of americans.

The prospect of monetizing beauty is almost irresistible.

I mean, the land is incredibly powerful, but the one power that it doesn't have is to articulate

What it is and what it wants.

Wilderness cannot be its own spokesperson.

Matt: All clear, kelly.

(music)

Kelly: That is so cool. "hi."

(music)

(music)

(laughs)

(music)

Ohhhh!

(music)

Pete: Got it.

Our boy jp's been taking care of us, helping with the food.

So he, he camouflaged it with mystique.

"dear person of curiosity, the content's insides mean life or death.

We're relying on this to survive, please leave it be so we can live.

Continue with great thanks."

Let's go see what we got.

(walking sound)

Kelly: Yeah!

Harlan: We're just kind of nearing the confluence of the little colorado river,

Which is kind of become a site that's been of recent conflict.

Some developers that are looking to install a tramway coming up off from the rim,

With this kind of paralleling the river coming down the side of the red wall cliff here and

Eventually meeting the river um right down near the confluence, right at the point of

The confluence of the colorado river and the little colorado river.

And then there'd be an entire establishment down there

Of restaurants and shops and walkways along the river.

It would completely change the face of this area.

Pete: So we're hiking up above the confluence, which is sacred

To three native american tribes here.

One of them is the navajo.

We're going to hike up and meet with them.

And this is their land now, we've left the national park.

And this route we're hiking up is basically shadowing where this tram would be built.

I'm trying to understand how it's dividing and affecting the navajo nation.

(music)

(music)

Ready.

Kevin: Uh, we just hiked out of the canyon.

We're headed for window rock, the capital of the navajo nation.

There's a legislative session where the escalade project is going to be debated.

Pete: How does it feel to be driving?

Kevin: It feels pretty cushy to be sitting behind the wheel of a truck.

Padded seat instead of walking.

(music)

Legislation has been introduced to the navajo nation.

It is making its way through a series of committees.

This is a project which is being sold as a solution

To the extraordinary economic challenges of the navajo nation,

And the developers who are behind this project are doing

Everything they can to ensure its passage.

Man: (native language),

If we start establishing these particular projects across

The navajo nation, how are we gonna be in five years, in ten years?

Why can't we invest back into our own cultural tradition way of life?

(native language)

Lamar: We're providing a solution to a need.

You're gonna employ an awful lot of people in an impoverished area,

And help them save their culture.

What's, what's better than that?

We're into this now 6 years and 4 million dollars in time and money,

I think everybody's entitled to have a, a grand canyon experience,

Whether it's on a mule or hiking or on a helicopter, and so we're trying to offer the average

Person that below-the-rim experience.

(music)

(music)

There's a little bit of elitism that says, "hey, well, you know, the average person

Shouldn't be able to enjoy the bottom of the canyon."

I mean, if I were to hike down to the bottom of the canyon I'd had to be airvac'd out

Because of my knees and ankles.

So, uh, oh so I'm not worthy of, of that type of experience?

There's lots of great places out there, um, where do you draw the line?

(music)

David: You know you're never gonna be on the top of everest,

You know you're never gonna be out in the middle of the ocean

In a kayak, you're never gonna be floating down grand canyon

Because maybe you're not able to do that.

We can't provide every experience for every person

Based on their own individual abilities and,

And it's just one of those balancing uh things that are,

It's difficult but at the same time I take a lot of pride in in how well we do do that.

: How do I say "smile" in navajo?

Woman: (speaks navajo)

Pete: (responds in navajo)

Woman: Y-you go like this. (speaks navajo)

(laughs)

Woman: You say it the wrong way, you can say it.

Pete: I'm sure I do.

And then how do I say, "thank you" again?

Woman: (speaks navajo)

Pete: Ah that's so hard.

Women: (speaks navajo)

Pete: The navajo need some economic stimulus

And this project's being sold to many of them as a solution.

But many of them that live right above the confluence feel like they're being ignored.

The navajo, they need to make a decision for their own land.

Renae: "we got to save it."

Our own nava-nation council have the power to protect it, they have the power to preserve it.

And that's what they need to act on, for their elders, for the generations to come.

Woman: (speaks navajo)

(speaking mavajo)

Translator: Um, she said that, "it's our identity,

We're a culture, the stories about us that are sold there.

That's what's gonna make money, we're not gonna make money."

Pete: I think that's the division that's in the navajo right now.

When I think the tram is being driven by development elsewhere.

(music)

It's not a singular issue; it's related to everything happening around the park.

Kevin: The people who are opposed to the tramway on the navajo reservation,

Primarily a group of women who belong to an organization called save the confluence,

Are fighting it with everything they've got.

And they are so outnumbered, and they are so out -gunned.

Rita: (speaks navajo).

Come by and sign our petition, we need your help.

We are trying to stop a developer from building a tramway to the bottom of the

Grand canyon, ok?

They project that it's gonna be up to 10,000 people a day.

Going up and down that tramway. Woman: Really?

Rita: This is development geared towards tourists.

Which is fine, you know, that's fine.

But not down there.

We're presenting these petition signatures to the navajo nation council,

And they're gonna be voting on it.

Did you guys get some stickers?

Put that on your hat.

(laughs)

Renae: The confluence.

This is where the colorado river meets the colorado river.

Where they meet, this is where life begins.

This is what our grandmothers tell us.

Our ancestors.

(music)

It is a sacred space, it is a sacred area.

You leave it the way you found it.

We don't want to see it develop, and we don't want to see the disneyland on the edge

Of the canyon.

If the tram comes through, it would dig into the beautiful landscape,

And that's why I fight so hard.

(music)

(music)

Pete: So it's, what day is it?

Tuesday?

It's Tuesday, and we'll try to do

About 14 miles today.

Ahhhh.

(music)

Kevin: I had a pretty significant connection

To the grand canyon before this project.

My dad had this dream of moving to the west.

I must have been in 4th or 5th grade.

One day he sat down and asked the family what we thought of the idea of pulling up stakes in

Pittsburgh and just moving to colorado.

And my dad's dream pretty much died that night at the dinner table.

But I retained memory of this, and is at the heart of what I do as a journalist.

(music)

I'd started apprenticing as a river guide, working on the river at the bottom

Of the canyon, getting to know that environment.

Pete: The poop boat? Kevin: The poo boat.

Pete: The poo boat, you're right, he rode the poo boat.

Kevin: All of this was part of the research for a book that I would later go on

To write called.

It was about this river guide by the name of kenton grua who set a speed record in a boat through

The heart of the grand canyon in 1983, and he was also the first person in recorded history to

Walk the length of the grand canyon, and the opportunity to walk in his footsteps was

Impossible for me to resist.

I knew the bottom of the canyon pretty well, but my entire perspective consisted of sitting

In a boat looking up.

(music)

I thought that the river was the key that unlocks the door that enables you to understand this

Landscape, and I realized that's totally untrue.

And the place where human beings have no control whatsoever is not the river.

It's the cliffs, and the ledges, and all of that bare naked rock.

It's a place that has no trail leading from one end to the other where very,

Very few people go.

And where the few people who do venture there quickly discover that they have no control.

(music)

Pete: Stay.

Ahh.

Getting out of the, the only water hole we can find is a bit hard.

Give me a holler.

Kevin: Woo!

Ahh!

Is there any water!?

Pete: Nooo!

Kevin: Great!

Water's a huge challenge. I mean, you'd think it wouldn't be that big of a deal

Because there's a river at the bottom of the canyon but,

You know, it's very rare that you're actually at the river level.

Much more often you find yourselves kind of marooned, several thousand feet [meters]

Above the river, several thousand feet below the rim.

You know, when you're in the middle of the desert, you must continuously be aware of how

Far you are moving away from the last water source and can you get back to it.

Pete: Feeling a bit salty, and heading out here to, to hopefully find water.

It's such an ongoing recurring theme that is what keeps us rolling out here,

The only thing at times.

Some running water sources, wind and erosion that create these little perfect pools

Of hopefully, they're full.

Everything around here, all these little tiny holes are dry.

It looks like a swimming pool from here.

Kevin: Oh!

Pete: So that is what we fear.

Bone dry.

Kevvie, pumpkin poo.

Kevvie!

Still can't find water.

It's just beating down on us.

Sun.

Beating down.

(exhales)

Kevin: I feel like I'm in a swedish sauna.

Pete: You look like you're getting a little bit of heatstroke there.

(labored breathing)

There it is.

We're afraid that would be dry.

Hey, we have water.

Kevin: No water?

Pete: No, there's water I could see it.

Kevin: Thank god.

Pete: Yeah, I know right?

It's right there.

I was starting to think we were done-ski.

(music)

(music)

I've actually spent a long time chasing water.

(music)

I grew up on a small cattle ranch in colorado,

Which is at the headwaters of the colorado river.

Learned to swim in it, learned to fish in it.

(music)

Did all sorts of ridiculous things in it.

(music)

What do you think pablo?

John: Um, too early to think.

We just feel.

(music)

Rider and ailerons are good. We all set?

Pete: All set.

John: We go.

Pete: My father's a pilot.

He flies a single engine plane; you know one of these bush planes.

John: Look how green it is over here.

Pete: I'm gonna go wing mount pablo.

John: Huh?

Pete: Look hard, look, look over.

John: Oh my god.

You can't hold that steady. No way.

Pete: No problem. John: No way.

Pete: My dad's always giving me the "you oughta" lecture.

"you oughta do this."

And he was telling me, "you oughta look at your backyard river,

You oughta look at your backyard, you're always going away."

So I started thinking and I was like, "you know maybe you're right."

The colorado river is this lifeline that supports 40 million people, 7 states,

2 countries.

And I wanted to know where does our irrigation water go?

How long does it take to reach the sea?

And the grand canyon was one spectacular beautiful 2 hundred and 77 mile stretch

In the middle of it.

But downstream, the river changes quickly.

You really see what happens when you ask too much of a resource.

It completely vanishes.

The river no longer reaches the sea.

(music)

That was a little bouncy.

(music)

(music)

Rich: This is very unusual to find something this large.

Most of the archaeology you find in this more recent period are much smaller points for rabbits

And deer.

Absolutely remarkable piece.

I finished my continuous thru-hike.

But I can't stay away.

You're giving me cheese?

Oh god, it's like a hundred calories.

Kelly and I were able to go back and join them with our friend amy martin.

Amy: Woo! We were able to find some other pieces,

And slowly put them together.

Looks like a big storage vessel.

Rich: I was enthusiastic about going back, and, you know,

See what they'd learned along the way.

They gotten their shit together, and, you know, it was like,

"holy cow maybe they can tell a story."

Pete: I'm gonna get some water from this pothole.

Maybe not.

In the winter in grand canyon, you could have snow, rain, sleet, and in the next section,

There's some places where you really need to know the route.

And it's so remote, uh, carrying enough food can be very tricky.

So I just wanted to go back and provide some first- hand knowledge

Of how to get through there safely.

Ve got uh, likelihood of snow tonight,

Snow tomorrow, down to uh maybe even 3,000 feet .

We're at about 46 hundred feet here so we're gonna get hammered pretty good.

This storm's gonna get pretty ugly.

Pete: (inaudible) stormy! Hoohoo

(heavy winds)

(background voices)

Kevin: So my big question is when do I start to panic?

Right now.

No idea how the hell we're gonna get out of here.

Rich: Holy...!

Pete: Hard to imagine now that's potentially 3,000 feet down.

(music)

I love the snow but it's making it a little challenging.

(music)

(music)

Rich: The storm was a lot worse than I expected we could get in the winter.

(music)

You have to concentrate on every single step that you put down, and if you hit ice and you slip,

You, you're gone, you're dead.

(music)

Kevin: I was really afraid that I was gonna slip and die and I was even more afraid

I think that somebody else was gonna slip and die.

(music)

(music)

Pete: The great thumb mesa, you walk around there's no way to come off it.

Everybody's cold, and everybody's hungry.

(music)

How you doin?

Kevin: Psh.

Rich: This is uh, owl eyes bay, and was named for those two incredible hollowed out ice

Sockets up there that look like a big owl.

And uh, in 2012, a friend of ours, ioana, was walking through here and uh, slipped,

And she fell 400 feet .

So uh, this, uh, place is you know special to us for, for uh, remembering her.

This monument right here, it's uh, neat to see that uh,

This is uh, surviving the test of time.

Kevin: The sun has just come up, literally,

And it is just lighting everything up.

Everything is going off.

Pete: Woohoo! That's what I'm talking about.

Kelly: Yeah!

Mmm, actually feels really good.

Rich: I love the sun in the morning, oh man would've been so cold.

This is the tour I signed up for, right here!

(laughs)

Kelly: Woohoo!

Aha.

Oh there's a little waterfall.

Kevin: How's the view?

Rich: (inaudible), unbelievable!

Pete: Olo canyon, it's like a doorway into the subway system of the grand canyon.

(music)

We have just come around what was the hardest, psychologically most challenging part

Of the trip into this eden that you don't even know exists if you go down the canyon by boat.

(music)

Rich: Olo canyon's incredibly beautiful.

There these grand cathedrals that are hidden in the fabric of grand canyon

That people don't ever get to see.

(music)

And then when the light changes the reflections on the pot holes just make you think

That you're seeing some kind of divine intervention.

(music)

(music)

Kelly: We have our olo pass!

We're gonna eat again!

Woo!

We are fat and happy tonight!

Rich: Stretched 8 days into 10 days.

(cheering)

Kelly: These are my favorite crackers!

Rich: Open up, cheez-its!

Oh my god, cheez-its.

(screaming and laughing)

Pete: Oh this is like christmas!

-What are these? Amy: Dark chocolate pomegranates.

Rich: Oh, yes, cheddar potatoes.

Kelly: Peanut butter pretzels.

Rich: Let's see the pete mcbride happy dance.

(laughs)

Pete: My ankle hurts, my ankle hurts but I don't care.

Have you ever run this thin on food?

Rich: Uh, no.

(laughing)

750 days in the grand canyon, and I usually exit with more than, you know, 5 peanut m&ms.

Kevin: The days are incredibly hard, but there is this

Moment in time that occurs almost every night.

It's when we finally stopped and set up camp.

(music)

We can hear the river far below, although this place was carved and polished and created

By the river that is flowing along its bottom, there's a second river.

It's the river that emerges after sunset, in the form of a ribbon of stars.

(music)

(music)

No matter how hard things get, there will be this moment that awaits you each and every night.

(music)

(music)

(native music)

(native music)

Carletta: Our job as havasupai is to keep our culture and keep our songs,

Cause that's all we have left as indigenous people.

(native music)

My reservation is about 20 miles from here, and the uranium mines are just waiting to contaminate

Our groundwater source, and when this contamination does reach our home,

There'll be no more havasupai.

No more of my people.

Curtis: The uh, native tribes they are well within their right to protest or oppose us

In any way they see fit.

Just like we're well within our right to, to mine this uh, deposit.

But I don't think that they would be satisfied unless we just announce one day

That we're abandon, abandoning this operation, and we're just not going to do that.

We need electricity for our cities, but look that stuff

Doesn't come from magical sources.

It comes from mining, it comes from oil and gas, it comes from drilling and that sort of thing.

The mining that we do out here is heavily regulated, we're the safest, we're the healthiest,

We do it the right way, we protect the environment.

I just really don't think that there's any chance that we're going to have any,

Any impact to the grand canyon through our operations here.

Kevin: There's been interest in mining in and around

The grand canyon pretty much from the very beginning.

This is one of the best places to find uranium ore, in the world.

Rich: During the 50s, 60s, and 70s especially, companies would come in, they'd sink shafts,

Mine ore, and when they figured out that the economic potential wasn't there,

Or the commodity prices of uranium for example had gone down, they'd just leave.

Pete: Horn creek comes off the south rim, and you walk by it and it's this very humble,

Perfectly clear creek, and it's the most obvious spot to get water.

But it sits below a defunct uranium mine.

You shouldn't drink horn creek, you're advised not to because the water's too contaminated.

Kevin: To be moving through the heart of the crown jewel of america's national park system

And you arrive at a spring that you can't drink from because it's got uranium in it,

It's radioactive, that is bizarre.

And that is also a reminder of how incredibly inter-connected this entire landscape is.

Rich: Water slopes into drainages that feed into the canyon,

Which feed into the colorado river, which flows right into lake mead.

Which you know provides drinking water to 40 million americans, right?

(music)

Kevin: Everything that happens on the rim of grand canyon profoundly affects

What happens inside of grand canyon.

That will have a profound effect on that matrix of life.

(music)

Those consequences are enormous.

Pete: It's a nice view.

Suddenly we're in western grand canyon.

It's remarkably silent.

A silence, and nothing but the sound of your feet for hours at a time.

It's a real luxury at many levels.

Pretty amazing.

You're making me nervous.

Kevin: Yeah well, it's pretty remarkable, I mean, over looking out at the,

Pete: Can you step back from the edge?

It's only 3,000 feet to the river.

This is maybe about the biggest drop we've seen.

What's your favorite layer?

Kevin: What's my favorite? Um.

I think I like the bright angel shale best for the name, the red wall for the color,

The coconino for the cross-bedded texturization, the kaibab because it's on top.

-(snoring) -(laughing)

I'm going to slowly work my way over to you, alright?

He would put himself last in pretty much every situation.

He's like the rudder.

And yeah the rudder may be at the back of the boat, but the rudder keeps you going.

Kevin: I think the best way to think of me is kind of as the tin can tied to the back bumper

Of the pete mcbride express train.

I mean you could go up high here, but unless you want to go under,

You could crawl under that.

(rocks falling)

Pete: You through? Kevin: Yeah.

Probably the thing about pete that I find most challenging to deal with is his tendency

To just undersell difficulty.

Pete: Back in here, all the way around here, all the way up here, out that.

Kevin: He'll say like, "oh yeah and we'll just cruise around this and then we'll head around

To this other point it's no problem and then maybe we'll get up there,

" and I'll look at the map and be like, "are you (bleep) kidding me?"

We're moving through a really hostile environment with really severe consequences

If you make mistakes and you are completely and utterly dependent upon and must trust

The person you are with.

Pete: Ah, not that one!

No no no no no no no no no!

Kevin: It's much bigger on my side.

Does it look good?

-Is it gonna look good? Pete: You can keep coming.

Kevin: Oh jeez, didn't see that.

Pete: He's worried about me because he knows I'm always going to bring my cameras but

I'm desperately worried about him because I feel like, you know he could walk into a stop

Sign by accident.

He has the potential to be a disaster at times.

Kevin: Ok I gotta.

Pete: Dude, dude, you just dropped.

Kevin: That's so out of my comfort zone that I need a passport to get back

To my freakin' comfort zone.

Pete: Would you come down please?

But friendship really carries us through.

And it may be an odd couple friendship but it's uh, yeah, it's a good one.

Alright now what's your opinion of the hiking?

Kevin: If I was like spiritually aware, right now I'd be doing yoga, or meditation, or um,

I don't know maybe I'd be writing something, you know, profound?

If I was this spiritually aware kind of dude that the girlfriend who dumped me after the first

Phase of this hike really wanted, that's what I'd be doing right now.

That's what the boyfriend that she wants to be with and.

Pete: What does this have to do with anything right now?

Kevin: I don't know!

You can delete this, put in the tape.

Pete: Kev and I, we can smell the barn on some level.

It's late March, and we know spring is starting to happen, and we're getting very close,

But we're moving slower than we anticipate, and we're not moving efficiently.

Man: Nice.

(panting)

Kevin: I fell into a barrel cactus, and now I got all these weird lumps on my arm.

Ok, let's put the camera away.

Ah, I will say though that my thumb feels somewhat numb.

Pete: Alright well just hold it up like that.

Kevin: Hold it like this? Ok.

Pete: Alright let me clean it up.

We're getting out to that edge of, of safety, and I just had this gut feeling that something

Would go horribly wrong if I pushed.

So our 57th day on the trail, or whatever.

Kevin turned his arm into a bleeding stuck mess.

Kevin: Kind of healing well, don't you think? Pete: Yeah I think uh.

Kevin: Don't say no, because out here in the middle of nowhere,

And not healing would be not good.

Pete: Grand canyon is winning right now.

Kevin: I'm trying to get a drink of water.

Pete: What's up with your bottles?

Kevin: They're pretty empty.

Pete: This the best we can do? Kevin: Yeah, for now.

(music)

It's out.

(music)

Bleh!

Pete: We're climbing a completely inconsequential pass

That I don't even think has a name.

So kevin and I are gonna name it, "the demoralizer,"

Unless you got another name for it you like.

Kevin: No that sounds quite appropriate right now.

Pete: What do you say?

Kevin: Dude, I don't know what to say. Woo woo! Grand canyon!

Sublime

Obi-wan-kenobi-style-jujitsu-wil derness-hoo-hah and I'm like

(bleep) that, that this just blows.

Oh man.

(laughing)

Pete: All right. Look where we've come from.

Kevin: Yeah look where we've come from!

Nowhere!

(music)

(music)

Pete: Are you ok? Kevin: Yeah.

Pete: I thought you fell. Kevin: No.

Pete: You scared the hell out of me. Kevin: It's the rocks.

Pete: A jumping cactus just jumped all over me.

Ahhh.

Jeez.

Ah god.

Kevin: As you go across the land, the noise changes according to the terrain.

Soft crunch as we move across the dirt of all kinds.

Red, and brown, and black, and pink, orange and tan.

When we move through it, across the hours and days, the dirt bleeds into us,

It works its way into the cracks of our fingernails, the lines at the edges of our eyes.

And deeper than that, it works its way into our veins, and perhaps even into the chambers

Of our hearts.

All of it, dirt, dust, the stuff that makes up the canyon itself, it becomes part of us,

And we become part of it.

(lighting)

Man: This place is bananas!

(making sounds)

Pete: I can't believe you guys found us.

Rich: Isn't it so good to see a big smile on kev's face?

(laughs)

Kevin: Please tell me you brought chocolate.

Rich: You got me!

Kelly: Yeah, it's tight through there.

(music)

Nice kev.

(music)

Pete: You started with us, and watched us detonate, and now you're back out here with us.

What the hell are you thinking?

Rich: I'm pretty proud to have a chance to finish with you guys, actually.

Pete: I don't think kev and I would be here if it weren't for you.

How you feeling?

Kevin: I'm feeling a little beat up but better than last night.

Rich: First flight.

Rich: Here they come.

Pete: Here it starts.

(helicopter aproching)

(helicopter aproching)

I wanted to experience walking through heli alley because this is the issue which

On many levels is driving a lot of the other issues, it's the economic engine that's creating

Development pockets around the park.

It became the most crowded, populated helicopter landing area in the world in a decade.

There's a lot of money being made, and that's where it's complicated.

Wooo.

All of these different native american tribes, they're seeing visitors unloading

Their wallets, why are they not making money? I get it.

And I'm no one to be telling someone not to fly, coming from a family of pilots.

It's just, how do we find a balance?

Walking with the remarkable ongoing sound of helicopters.

Well over 200, walked right past a bunch of them.

And uh, ah.

In 8 hours, I counted 363 helicopters, and that was just an average Tuesday.

This happens 7 days a week, all year long.

Kevin: It's been just a constant presence throughout the day.

It's added a feeling of intensity and intrusion to the landscape, and uh,

Robbed it of the signature quality, one of the two signature qualities

Rock being one but silence being the other.

(music)

(music)

(music)

Pete: Hello bush.

(music)

(music)

Wow.

(music)

Alright, the end of the trail.

Not a single, not a single complaint hiking with you.

Kevin: I thought there were a few moments out on the esplanade

Where you were ready to get rid of me.

Pete: There's probably been a few I thought you wanted to get rid of me but

I don't even remember them now.

Kevin: No it's been amazing.

Pete: Start running. Kevin: No we're gonna do this together.

Pete: You got a lead on me. Kevin: Ok ready? Let's go.

Pete: No we're doing this together.

Step over the imaginary line.

Alright.

Kevin: Ready to do this?

Pete: Yeah you? Kevin: Yep.

Pete: End of the park. Kevin: End of the park.

-Here we go. Pete and kevin: Boom!

Rich: Alright!

Pete: I'm in the park!

I'm not in the park!

I'm in the park!

I'm not in the park!

Rich: Nice work guys, congrats.

Pete: It's awesome!

Woo-hoo!

(music)

Rich: Uh, I completely underestimated you guys.

I mean you and kev uh, just absolutely had to be committed for uh.

(laughs)

Rich: I'm low on water, so I guess I gotta stop this it.

(music)

(music)

Renae: We are in wind rock, arizona in front of the council chambers today for a special

Session of the navajo nation council, which was called

To expressly address the escalade legislation.

So we hope to be heard, and hopefully voted up.

Man: Again here we are in front of the navajo nation council.

If you look back at the revenue share you'll see sales tax, hotel taxes, that's,

That's what the nation will be receiving.

As the numbers of this just goes up, your share of the revenue goes up.

Dwight: I don't know what businesses that say, "oh, by the way,

We don't want to pay taxes."

Man: I'm wondering about your comments saying that it's job creation when actually

It would be the navajo nation to be fronting the whole bill.

Activist: You're not being honest, sir.

Man: Thank you.

Activist: You have not consulted with the water people.

You have not consulted with the wind people.

Man: Thank you.

Ok, motion to cease debate unless you want to continue on.

Ok, simple majority.

Going once, going twice, going three times.

By vote of two in favor, 16 opposed, the motion fails.

(applause)

Renae: No. More. Escalade.

The navajo nation council said no escalade!

(cheering)

Rita: Yes, yes, they listened to us.

I'm going to go home and sleep for two days.

(cheering)

(music)

Kevin: The canyon is a ruthless cathedral, and like all holy places, invites people to think,

Reflect, and I think above all to move towards and embrace an element of humility.

(music)

It invites us to reframe our perspective of where we stand, and forces us to conclude that

In the end, we are not large, we are not important, and we do not matter.

And we so need that.

(music)

Pete: I went in to try to understand the place.

And I'm still trying to understand it.

I think it changed me.

Maybe I walked out of there with a little jar of silence and simplicity.

It reminded me why it's important that a place like this exists,

And that's I think the question with any national park.

Do we want them to be these coddled landscapes of amusement, or do we want them to be

Experiential where you might actually shed some layers

And be reminded of what's important in the world.

If we can't protect grand canyon as a national park,

Then what can we protect?

(music)

(music)

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